Water Damage to IT Equipment | Flood Protection Solutions

Posted 25. 06. 2018

As a business owner you want to concentrate on growing and developing your company. The last thing you may think about is the risk of flooding but as we used to say in the Scouts – Be Prepared! You may imagine the odd virus on the network, and you can see all the spam emails that are trying to get through to your inbox, but have you thought about the impact if your office were to be flooded?

Whether you become the victim of a burst water pipe, or a ‘natural disaster’ water will damage IT equipment irreparably. Most server rooms have some form of ventilation or climate control but very few use water detectors and almost none have alerting for flooding.

Some IT admins and IT support companies still choose to locate IT equipment on the floor meaning they are particularly at risk. If you have been considerate enough to use a server rack you may still find extension cables and power cables at floor level meaning your servers and expensive IT equipment is still at risk from shorts and power surges if water submerges them.

At Liberate IT we like to consider all aspects of safety and security. When we supply new servers and equipment we use surge protection on top of black-out/brown-out protection through UPS (uninterruptible power supply) equipment. We regularly tidy cabling and improve racking of equipment for our IT support clients and advise using water detectors to help alert clients of flood risks before they cause damage to equipment and loss of data. Once a leak is detected it is important to have the plan and facilities in place to deal with flooding and prevent further damage.

Alarming statistics released by CNBC in 2017 show that 40% of small businesses never recover from a disaster. It’s not just the loss of IT equipment that will harm your business, but the loss of your data. Years and even decades of software development, customisations and valuable data can be wiped without a trace after a flood. Protect your business data by mitigating the risk of flooding, and using a reliable and proven backup strategy such as the Liberate IT cloud backup service.

We can restore your data in our cloud server environment giving you remote access to all your systems from home or a backup office. We will even restore your data to temporary hardware and deliver to your office to get your business back online. All these services are included with our standard IT Support contracts. We take a considerate approach and take the worry out of your IT. Sleep soundly knowing our 24/7 alerting and monitoring will help protect your business from everything life can throw at them, from flooding to cyber security, Liberate IT Support has you covered.

Sole UK distributors of the Water Gate Barrier

The Water-Gate barrier from Megasecur is used in 36 countries around the world. As the sole UK distributor of this flood barrier, we distribute the product across the entire country. The Water-Gate barrier is highly innovative and easily deployed, offering one of the fastest deployment of water
barriers available. Access to emergency vehicles and other barriers is not compromised as the barrier can be driven over.

The Water-Gate can be shaped around corners and on uneven surfaces, offering flexible protection, and can be joined to create any length. The barrier can be supplied in crates to make deployment of long lengths extremely rapid.
It is cost effective, comparing particularly well with sandbags, especially as it is reusable.

The material used is recyclable and the Water-Gate is reusable making it extremely environmentally friendly.
The barrier is resistant to a long list of chemicals and has been independently tested. It is widely used in pollution control.